This Is Entirely In Caps
Good Lord, you are entirely correct old legume.
Perhaps we should test their algorithm
THIS IS IN CAPS but this is not
We have this system called “writing”. It’s essentially a shared understanding as to what we mean by a number of pre-agreed squiggles and spaces in various shapes and sizes, laid out in a pre-agreed fashion. There is no particular magic to what we have agreed represents what, but the system works because we’ve all pretty much reached agreement. One of the things that has wide if not universal acceptance is that using all caps conveys that one’s words are heavily emphasised and possibly angry (as if shouted). This has particularly wide (though not by any means universal) acceptance in internet writing. This could easily be viewed as a positive, if for no other reason then at least because it is potentially useful*. It means that if you want to convey the idea that you are shouting, you can use all caps. If this convention did not exist, you might have to indicate that you were shouting in some other less efficient way.
I don’t know why you find this a bit of a joke.
*Note use of italics for mild emphasis, a practice I find to be a bit of a joke. I mean, give me a break, eh?
No. It looks like someone typing in capital letters.
This convention of saying that typing in caps means shouting to me is a very recent idea.
CairoCarol writes:
> Non-native speakers of English often use capitals in Wierd Ways based on their
> mother tongue. For example, doesn’t German capitalize all Nouns? By contrast,
> Arabic has no Capitals, so native arabic speakers Writing in english sometimes
> simply misapply the rules And the mistakes are not obvious to Them also since
> Arabic has no “sentences” as we have them in English.
Of course Arabic has sentences. All languages have sentences. It’s just that frequently (especially in older texts) there is no punctuation marking the separation between sentences. Also, apparently the sentences in written Arabic tend to be long. It’s apparently fairly common when reading aloud written Arabic to break the sentences down into shorter ones.
And an “h” looks like a vertical line with the top half of a curved semi-circle halfway down, then a vertical line straight down from the unattached end of the semi-circle to the same level as the bottom of the first vertical line.
Your point is?
So?
His son-in-law is an ex-Microsoft technician. He doesn’t need me to explain anything to him. I think he’s doing well just getting on the Internet.
I’ve heard that whenever something goes wrong with his computer, he just gives it to his son-in-law and buys another, so I don’t think I’ll make any suggestions.
Do you read books?
I think using all caps must be very effective in Nigerian scam letters. 
Well, yeah, there’s also that.
Yes
People have to keep educating others about Netiquette .
So the fact that this goes on shows that many people do not know about this idea that typing in caps is considered shouting.
The last book I read was Affluenza by Clive Hamilton and Richard Denniss. There was no shouting.
http://www.echonews.com/1129/book_reviews.html
In that case, I’m honestly surprised you’re not already familiar with the widespread convention of rendering shouted dialogue in caps.
Of course, but people have to be educated about all sorts of widely-accepted conventions, in all areas of life.
I did not say that I was not aware of it. I was trying to make a point that someone shouting at you is so different from someone typing in caps in an email or message board that it is a bit of a joke to say the two are equivalant.
Is it possible to inadvertently shout at people?
A friend’s emails are always in caps. I wondered why she did that. In my job the data has to be in caps. I’ll switch over to email and start typing to find that I have the caps lock on and have to start over. I assume that my friend uses caps in her job, and just doesn’t turn off the caps lock when she writes an email.
Yes, if you’re wearing headphones, although I’m not sure what that has to do with the price of eggs in Norwich.
If I was to type:
[Bugs Bunny voice]What’s up doc?[/Bugs]
would you describe that as being so different to saying something to you in a Bugs Bunny voice that it is a bit of a joke to say the two are equivalent?
I think my answer is yes. But it is very difficult to understand you.